Microsoft Comic Chat is now open source
Microsoft has open-sourced 'Comic Chat,' a 1990s-era chat client that utilized comic-style panels and introduced the world to the Comic Sans font. The release allows developers and historians to explore the code behind this early experiment in visual online communication.
Why it matters
It preserves a piece of internet history that influenced how modern messaging apps handle avatars, expressions, and visual communication.
The chat client that brought Comic Sans to the world is now on GitHub
Today, we’re excited to announce the open-source release of Microsoft Comic Chat , the chat client that automatically turned conversations within Internet Relay Chat (IRC) into comic panels featuring illustrated characters, speech bubbles, and expressions, and helped introduce the world to a little font called Comic Sans .
Yes, that Comic Sans. Originally designed by Microsoft typographer Vincent Connare in 1994, Comic Sans found its first real home in Comic Chat, where its informal, hand-lettered feel matched the software’s speech-bubble conversations perfectly.
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